Oh Jinkim, I'm sure you'll ace it. You've worked hard so now just take a deep breath, go in there and get the proper reward for all that work. You'll be fine! (up)

All the best of luck Cakeman! It must feel great getting to this stage. Enjoy it and do let us know how you get on (up)

Hi Sneaks,

What I usually do is plunge right in. I take the first in the pile and mark it 'provisionally' (i.e. I write my impressions on a notepad, indicating all the strengths and weaknesses of the essay and I just rely on my overall first impression to come up with the mark I think it deserves). I don't initially write this mark on the essay - I only correct errors of grammar, style, structure and content in pencil but I keep the final mark and comments for when I've read all of the essays. I do this with each essay and then look through my notes to compare. Some of my provisional marks may change because I tend to mark on a curve so any one essay mark will be reflective of its relation to the others. Only when I've got my list of comments and marks on my notepad do I go back and actually write them on the individual essays. Hope this makes sense and is of some help.

Congratulations Chrisrolinski, brilliant news !

Thanks Amanda, just knowing there's another PhDer out there working helps. Congrats on those conclusions!

Arraaagh, I just want to curl up and watch something entertaining on iplayer but I HAVE TO MAKE SOME SERIOUS PROGRESS. This has gone on so long and I feel like I'm falling by the wayside in every respect (job prospects, publication output, conference attendance), all because I keep putting things off in order to finish the thesis and the months just pass me by (as does life in general) while I sit here and grapple with sentences. I'm staying up tonight until I finish this section, I don't care how tired I get!

Good work vibes to everyone else braving the lonely hours.

Wow! Many congratulations. Your story is inspiring Dr Bilbo. I'm more of a lurker rather than an habitual poster but I've followed your progress and I'm delighted for you:-)

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KEEP GOING CHRISROLINSKI !!!!! You are so very close. Just do what you can, it's all progress. I understand your frustration. I am SICK looking at my thesis now but a bit more pain and it will all be worth while. You're much closer to the finishing line than I am and I always think you sound really determined and driven in your posts. So what if it takes an extra few weeks. Can you get a small overdraft to keep going? You're not alone sprout (sprout) ;-)

(By the way, I'm using you and Sue for inspiration/motivation)

Hey Badgerspy, I hope you were able to get some help from your Uni IT people. I don't have any tips, sorry, and hope I'm not hijacking your thread but I've been worried about the health of my own laptop of late and I'm eager to know if anyone has a model they are particularly happy with that has been less of a pain than most?

Heifer, Congratulations!! This is the first time I've heard of someone passing with NO CORRECTIONS! Thanks for taking the time to share details of the viva, I'm sure it's the last thing you wanted to think about but its so helpful for the rest of us :-)

KC, I completely relate to what you're saying. I often think back to my undergraduate days, especially the final year, and gape in awe at the determination I had then. It's funny, I didn't think I was working overly hard at the time but I used to work in the library all the hours during the day when I didn't have classes, then head home for dinner and actually go back out to the Uni library until closing time. I wanted to do well and constantly had the end in sight and applied myself to that end with the necessary energy and passion. Now, once it hits about 8 or 9 in the evening, I just can't seem to drag my sorry self back to work. Like you, I do love my subject but I have to force myself to sit down and write and am constantly amazed at the energy others seem to put into related (but not obligatory) tasks, like organizing conferences etc. I feel so un-dynamic and unambitious sometimes, even though I do think academia is the only career for me. I am (hopefully) nearing the end now and have presented at various conferences and have a couple of small publications... but it is, as I think you implied, more a question of the difference in motivation levels between myself in the past and now. I think you are perhaps being a bit hard on yourself. It is important to keep adding to the CV but the PhD process in general requires stamina more than flights of passion. I love my subject but the reality is that when doing a doctorate, most of the time you just have to force yourself to work even though you don't want to. It's not like studying for exams, in some ways it's less pressurized but ultimately more grueling and it's hard if not impossible to sustain the same level of passion for the whole journey.

I always find that committing to do a conference presentation or submitting something to an editor gives me a bit of an extra challenge and some welcome time away from chapter-writing. Although before doing these things I often have thoughts like 'I can't be bothered', during the process of doing them I get a little spark of passion that I don't get from everyday thesis work.

I think you should cut yourself some slack. Sounds to me like you're doing well. You will notch up CV material bit by bit.

Well done Jojo! I managed to salvage something from my day eventually, but still didn't get as much work done on my chapter as I'd have liked. I turned the internet off completely and it was during that time that I wrote a few good paragraphs. I'm doing the same thing today in the hope of getting some focus. The internet is going off at 10:30am until this evening and I'm only stopping to eat and go for a couple of walks on my breaks. I hope your productivity continues into today-- don't make yourself available. Nobody who works in any other kind of job can be around to pick up the phone to family in the middle of the day so why should we?

Jojo, I'm with you on this. I've found all sorts of worries are impinging on my ability to work steadily each day but I am desperate to finish. First things first, I need to make today count so that I can have an anxiety-free rest tonight. Let's just tell ourselves to be completely selfish for today- it's about us and our work, nothing else is getting a look in (and for me that includes money worries, family worries, and panicky moments about the state of the academic job market)- I'm putting them in a basket and floating them down the river of 'let me be' (at least until tomorrow). Just going to get some coffee and then its me and the thesis until dinner time. Good luck Jojo (up)

Sue, I am in a very similar position to yours. It's got to the point where, when I do make a trip into the city I actually enjoy seeing such a variety of people on the trains and buses and street and dream of what it would be like to work a 5-day week and have a guiltless weekend off. In the beginning, and even for the first couple of years, I was still able to romanticize my position... all that has stopped now (that writing has become increasingly harder and money has run out) and I am desperate for a change of lifestyle. I've also been putting the maintenance of my friendships on hold but thankfully my friends are all wonderfully supportive. All I can say is, you are most definitely not alone and maybe we have to get to this point before we are actually able to make the final push to expel this thing from our lives and move on to the next phase. I'm sending you perseverance vibes- we will get there soon! (up)

Another happy ending! Woohoo. Congratulations Dr K. I am living the experience vicariously through you and Dr Lara in the hope that I'll be joining you soon. Well done ;-)